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I am dropping a new "mechanic belt" style belt this sunday. It's 40mm wide double layered webbing construction, with elastic segment for more comfort, a tec-sys segment with few loops and carefully designed velcro closure with alignment loop (so you have the velcro closed nicely most of the time). The belt is size specific with minimal branding, no long tail (I was thinking P23 drawstrings are enough). The lack of metal buckle makes it airport and action sport friendly. More pictures soon on my IG(@aokuco). End of spam.

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Still one of my favorite pairs of sunglasses, Jean Paul Geaultier not sure of the model. Maybe it's just my 9 year old self projecting how much of a bad ass Leon I thought was when I first saw the film.

Higher materials + labour cost, as well as more 'design' yet with a lower price... arbitrary pricing = cash grab.

It’s not a cash grab. Pricing also needs to reflect perceived value. I would assume to most consumers a cool belt feels like it’s worth more than the straps. So the business uses that to offset losses or lower margins elsewhere. This is retail 101. If you don’t like it or see he value don’t buy it, get a cheaper belt. But I don’t see them doing anything wrong here.

7

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And just to add: Pricing is complicated. Business is complicated. Often products are sold at close to a loss, and others have huge profit margins. It’s all about balancing market opportunity/demand, material costs, quality, production, distribution, labour, marketing, and much more. It’s not as simple as $8 in materials, or which product cost more to make. How much is the material cost of a flyknit trainer? Not much. And they’re made by low-wage workers, but still sell for $200. It’s up to consumers to choose if that’s a value proposition that they like or don’t like. I’d rather buy a $62 belt that’s $8 of material, but made by people earning a living wage and sold by a company with a perspective... Similarly, an acrnm jacket is’t $2k of material or labour... Bringing physical products to market is complicated, expensive, time consuming, and a constant balancing act to stay in business.

A $100 belt made by sweat shop workers out of cheap materials with a logo slapped on it is a cash grab. A $62 belt made of good materials by people paid well and with a healthy profit margin to sustain a good company is smart product design.

I think you've all missed the reason for my complaint. It's a price of webbing with a buckle... and it was added to the product line to fill out an easy cash grab with a low-cost item in a market that's known to sell reliably. If it had some 'design' to it, i'd be there championing it with you all... but it's about 6cents in webbing attached to a 6$ buckle... designed and executed in a few minutes time. I love DSPTCH, own a good amount of it too... but seeing things like this low hanging crap added to a product line sadden me.

(for those of you not familiar with the Fidlock V-buckle, it locks and cannot disconnect when under load. So in an application like this the quick disconnect function is lost, as you'll need to loosen before disconnecting)

Edited August 30, 2018 by the-intern

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@the-intern if you want to critique their design or choice of buckle, that’s cool. But that’s not where you started, and I still don’t think the parts-cost reductionism is valid. I don’t believe they half-assed it on purpose, so someone put some work into it to some degree. It’s made in California, $15 minimum wage, so even if it only takes 15 minutes to put one together that’s still getting close to $15-20 including parts before all the other costs of getting it into shops are factored in. I don’t begrudge them a profit margin, especially since the margin on some of their other stuff is really slim. If it’s not a good enough design and there’s no market, then they won’t sell.

Personally, I liked it at the shop and thought that it seemed well considered and robust. I have another V-Buckle belt, and a bag strap, both of which will open just fine under the load tension of regular daily use. If you tighten your belt so that it really cinches your waist then maybe it would be an issue... hasn’t been for me.

I do the same when pricing menu items at my restaurant. Some items incur very little cost/prep time but can easily be marked up as they’ll sell readily due to a general familiarity with the product/concept. Whereas higher prep time/product cost dishes are priced lower by comparison in order to showcase our technique and skill.

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but seeing things like this low hanging crap added to a product line sadden me.

You've massive talent, no doubt, but you're severely lacking in business sechel (I mean that in the nicest way possible :D). "Low hanging fruit" is literally what businesses go after day after day. If there's a need in the market and you are in a position to fill it, you fill it.

While it has nothing to do with the ongoing discussion (and taking sentenences out of their context is problematic), this reminds me of the story about a national alpine equipment importer trying to shop Tilak to stores around the country a few years ago and them all declining on the basis that it would ruin their pricing scheme (set with Mamut/Arcteryx et al).